


Interest

by tieria



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! ARC-V
Genre: M/M, Present Tense, minor spoilers up to ep 62
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-02
Updated: 2015-07-02
Packaged: 2018-04-07 08:14:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,835
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4256055
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tieria/pseuds/tieria
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Despite the suspicions, his instincts telling him it's only going to head for disaster- he's interested in Dennis. (It doesn't help that Dennis started it, really.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Interest

**Author's Note:**

> written as of episode 62, spoilers up to there  
> (in before episode 63 makes the back half of this fic completely au haha)

Shun, quite frankly, isn’t used to losing.

In the quiet days of Heartland, the ones Shun remembers with an aching fondness, Yuuto, Ruri, and Shun had built up quite the reputation for themselves. They were the youth of Heartland’s strongest trio, and when one stumbled or faltered, the other two would be there with a particular brand of passionate loyalty to cover each other’s backs.

In Heartland’s not-so-quiet days, the days of the Resistance, losing meant death- Shun made it out alive, so he lets that particular fact speak for itself.

 In his days in Standard, he’d only lost once against Fusion’s child soldier, but strictly speaking, that did nothing but tie their record. (After all, he’s still alive. He still has a shot at saving Ruri, and that’s the closest thing to a victory he’s had so far.)

But against Dennis…

Shun wants a rematch. Shun wants a rematch, and it almost startles him how intensely the desire rises up within him once he puts a name to the feeling. The emotion is akin to the first time he tried a riding duel, a ball of warm excitement that rises in his chest somewhere just right of his heart and spreads through his body like the blood rushing through his veins, just a tinge of nervous energy lingering at the edges.

But the suspicion is there too, brewing low in the back of Shun’s mind like storm clouds threatening a thunderstorm in the hours to come. Without a concrete direction to take it, however, Shun lets it be, forces himself to wait for more evidence before jumping into action. He’s made his reckless assumptions back in Standard, when the anger against anything and everything with affiliation to “fusion” was still a fresh wound that refused to scar over, but time has passed since then, as little as it may have been, and Shun has come to realize that catching innocents in the crossfire is Fusion’s method of operation. It goes without saying that Shun would rather avoid stooping to his enemy’s level whenever possible.

:::

But when he stops to think about it, really, Shun isn’t entirely sure what he wants from Dennis anymore. He’s suspicious and irritated and too damn tired of seeing the shadow of Yuuto’s smile every time he looks at Yuuya-

And some (perhaps traitorous) bit of himself is interested, which is why he finds himself cornering Dennis in the back of their prison cell while Gongenzaka and the other two men have gotten clearance to go somewhere or other, pins him to the wall, and leans down to kiss him quickly.

Dennis looks vaguely embarrassed, bringing up a hand to scratch gently at the back of his own head as Shun pulls back.

“I, uh, didn’t think that you’d actually catch on,” he explains when Shun sends him a sharp, curious look.

Dennis takes a quick glance around the empty room before continuing, though he must know as well as Shun that the room is otherwise empty. “I mean, are you sure? I didn’t think you’d be interested.”

“We’ve known each other for what, a week? I’m not sure of anything,” Shun replies as he leans down to kiss Dennis again, and this time, Dennis reciprocates.

(He’s not really sure how he feels about that, either, other than it’s better than being alone.)

:::

“Come on, there has to be a better way to settle this,” Dennis says, forcing a friendly calm into his voice as he jumps between Shun and the prisoner across the aisle from him, much to Shun’s displeasure. He’s confident he could land a solid two punches on the inmate before the other man could retaliate, maybe land a hit on the guy lurking around looking for a piece of the action before anything _really_ starts to hurt.

With a quick glance at the inmate and a hand motion that reminds Shun of someone trying to calm a small dog, Dennis turns his back to the other prisoner and pulls Shun to the side, pulling him down slightly to whisper in his ear. “Come on, Kurosaki, just hand over a card. We all have some extra cards we say we’re going to use one day but never do, right? Or a fourth copy of an extra deck monster hidden somewhere just in case? Just give it to him, we’ve been here for less than a day.”

Dennis is right. Shun _knows_ he’s right. One of the things LDS had been generous with was providing him with new cards, and he has no need for some of the cards he had originally carried with him to Standard. But it’s for that very reason that he can’t turn them over, can’t lose those fond Heartland memories made manifest in them.

Shun shakes himself free of Dennis, stares at the inmate with all the defiant airs of a Resistance fighter behind his glare. The man chuckles lowly, cracks his knuckles, and charges at Shun with all the grace of a man who hadn’t seen a real fight in a decade, at the very least.

(Shun is wrong- he takes down nine men and is well on his way to incapacitating the tenth before Security manages to pry him off.)

:::

“I would have given you a card, you know,” Dennis eventually says after they’re reunited, the Lancers roughed up from Security’s pursuit units but otherwise no worse for wear, “I got plenty of extra Entermages after joining the Lancers.”

Shun just barely resists the urge to voice his disdain. Instead, he turns his back as deliberately as possible to Dennis to make his way over to the couch in the spacious room Gallagher had provided for the final few days before the Fortune Cup.

He sits down, crosses his arms and closes his eyes, and tries to pretend that he doesn’t hear Dennis sigh and make his way over, settling down next to Shun as if he hadn’t just voiced what Shun hates the most about LDS- _‘Or wherever Dennis is really from_ ,’ the quiet voice in the back of his head reminds him. It sounds suspiciously like how Ruri used to chide him.

“Oh, come on, Shun, it’s not like Akaba didn’t give us enough cards to stock a small army. I already replaced the extra cards I gave away, it would have been fine.” Dennis presses closer to Shun’s side. Shun forces his eyes to stay closed, fights the instinct to shirk away from Dennis’ presence so close.

Dennis, apparently unamused by Shun’s lack of reaction, continues, “Even magic or trap cards would have worked. I mean, your XYZ monsters aren’t that valuable in the first place, but…”

It’s the same insult as before. It’s the same insult, and, at least in Synchro, where XYZ cards were unheard of, obviously incorrect, and Shun refuses to let himself be goaded by it.

Shun opens his eyes, turns his head and shoots a glare at Dennis. “I think I’ve proved you wrong.”

Dennis just smiles back, and Shun’s irritation at having given him a response increases accordingly. “Did you really?”

“Should I remind you?”

Dennis doesn’t reply, just continues to smile, lips and eyes tinged with mischievousness, satisfaction, and a little bit of a challenge lurking beneath the surface-  

And it hits him then- that’s why he’s interested in Dennis.

A person who would challenge him so brazenly, someone who could match their insults and sweeping boasts with real skill to keep their words from ringing hollow, and someone who was just as interested in the same thing in others…

Shun leans over and kisses Dennis again, and it’s exhilaration that he feels when he does, starting from where his lips catch Dennis’ and racing through him like the promise of a rematch.

“Aren’t we doing this backwards?” Dennis says when they break apart, and Shun answers him with a curious hum, still riding the waves of thrill and excitement.

“I mean… Aren’t you supposed to get to know someone before you kiss them?” Dennis pauses, pulls Shun back in close. “Not that I mind, really.”

_‘If you tell me the truth,’_ Shun thinks to say, but Dennis’ lips on his cut him off before he has the chance to put form to the words, and then they’re lost, to be remembered only by Shun’s nagging suspicions.

:::

Dennis, perhaps surprisingly, isn’t the most outwardly affectionate- but in the end that suits Shun just fine.

Instead, Dennis is content to lounge around Shun, pressed into his side or head in his lap whenever Dennis can manage it, sometimes quiet, reading one of the books left on dusty shelves, sometimes chatting, Dennis trying and often failing to get him to open up about life in Heartland before the war.

He trades a story for a story on the days Shun feels like dredging up memories, one memento of Heartland as it used to be, vibrant and full of laughter, for a memory of a first street performance, a stage debut, or a particularly fascinating duel.

On the days Shun won’t, or simply can’t, Dennis takes it upon himself to talk about the future instead. Dennis speaks about their future as if they’ll make it through this war alive, alive and _together_ , as if the former alone wasn’t a longshot in and of itself-

“A date,” Dennis says, closing the book in his lap and leaning his head on Shun’s shoulder, “We’ll go on a date in New York City.”

During the day, take Ruri along and tour the New York City sights (and Dennis knows them all, even if, in true native fashion, he’s never been to half of them), sample the best food, watch the crowds, wash away the bad memories- at night, a Broadway show, just the two of them.

It’s romantic and cliché, and realistically, Shun doesn’t think it’ll ever happen, but it reminds him of how Ruri and Yuuto would talk of adventure in the days before, so he lets Dennis talk.

(In the end, he listens to every word, finds himself wondering if there was anything left standing in Heartland to return the favor, and tries to pacify his suspicions telling him that the reason Dennis has never been to half of New York City’s most well-known landmarks is because he’s not a native at all.)  

:::

It’s all going to come crashing down.

Everything will come crashing down the day that Shun’s suspicions overtake him, the day Dennis makes a move that he simply can’t dismiss-

But in this moment, with the Friendship Cup lurking on the horizon alongside the dawn of the next day and the promise of a rematch rising with it, with Dennis lounging casually beside him, idly watching as Shun goes through his deck for a final time, the light from City’s brilliance filtering over them through the window like a reminder of everything he’s lost, Shun lets the moment be and savors the companionship he’s denied himself since Heartland first started to crumble.


End file.
